Page 107 of The Empire and the Wolf King

“Nae, it’s fine.” He poked it again. “It’s good, right, I did it?”

Blakely said, “We dug it up, we stole it, we used it, and now we’re replacing it. We cannot be blamed for anything going wrong. But also, I don’t know if this matters…” She reached in her pocket and pulled out three ChapSticks and dropped them into the chest. “In case someone in medieval times needs it.”

Liam said, “I daena think this is for the fellows in medieval times. This castle haena been built then. How would they find it?”

She said, “Oh right, the castle hasn’t been built yet, so… it’s for people time traveling in the…?”

“More recent centuries, I think.”

They both looked down on the box.

She said, “They will still need ChapStick though. I wish we could put some batteries and a bottle of antibiotics in as well.”

Liam said, “There’s no’ enough room for everything they might need in their world.”

We walked down the road about a mile to a small stone circle in a field.

Blakely was looking down on her phone at the map coordinates, Liam had a shovel on his shoulder, walking merrily. They both were dressed casually, looking like rich people who were outside working in their garden.

Finch and I, on the other hand, looked totally out of place, like we were from LA. Finch looked like a rich rock star: his boots were shiny, he had bracelets on his wrist, his clothes were dark, and his jeans were perfectly tailored. And I looked like his wife, my clothes were designer, the kind that were for traveling with a rock star, with the possibility of being photographed. Neither of us brought clothes for digging in the garden.

We came to the stone circle and I said, “I was jet lagged and ready to just sleep and somehow I’ve been tricked into sightseeing.”

Blakely laughed, “I was just going to hangout and hear all about LA and civilization, but here I am about to be a tour guide…”

She grinned. “Do you know anything about the Croft Moraig stone circle?”

I said, “No, tell me about the Croft Moraig stone circle. You’ve got facts?”

Liam said, “Aye, she has facts, all she does is research the stuff around here.”

“It’s fascinating!”

He said, “Accordin’ tae my personal research, this is where the local teens come out at night tae drink beer.”

Blakely said, “I won’t bore you with details, but this stone circle was excavated in 1965, it dates back to 2000 BC.”

“4000 years old, that’s amazing!”

Finch looked around, “Right here on the side of the road?”

Liam said, “Aye.”

Blakely said, “There are 1300 stone circles in Britain and Ireland.” She looked down at her phone, “But the reason we are here is because we are looking for the guardian tree. On the north side, beside the boulder, about a foot down, there will be a chest…”

Liam looked over her shoulder and pointed. “It's that one.”

There was a large, gnarly looking tree, the largest in the area. I said, “Looks like a guardian, and there’s the small boulder.”

The tree had grown on and over a boulder, now embedded in the base of its trunk, lifted a bit by the root nestled around it.

Liam walked over and ran his fingers over the boulder. “Check this out, it’s got an M engraved on it.”

We all looked. Blakely said, “Magnus?”

Liam nodded. “North side, too.” He stuck the point of his shovel into the dirt, right in front of the boulder, stepped on the spade, lifted a hunk of dirt, and dumped it to the side.

I joked to Finch, “We came to Scotland to watch Liam dig holes.”

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